


Suitable Clothing

by Alex_Quine



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-10
Updated: 2015-02-10
Packaged: 2018-03-11 12:39:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3327308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alex_Quine/pseuds/Alex_Quine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John is well pleased by his morning's work.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Suitable Clothing

**Author's Note:**

> So, what can we glean from the recent set photos? This ficlet of fiction was originally posted in my LJ journal.

  
  
The street was filling up with people in Victorian costume and an earnest young woman with headphones and a clipboard had taken him by the elbow and placed him next to a boy with spectacularly blackened teeth, selling newspapers.  There was a bit of red cardboard on the pavement beneath his right foot and he had to keep, she said, to his ‘mark’ no matter what.  There would be a hansom cab passing him at speed and he would be pulled away by the newspaper boy, who was thirty-five and an ex-jockey on a second career.  
  
John wasn’t about to tell her that if Sherlock caught his eye, he’d be off like a shot, but he was finding it harder to keep track of Sherlock in the crowd.  At first he’d been able to locate him by the black topper.  No-one carried himself quite like Sherlock, even kneeling there was a set to his shoulders that challenged you if you weren’t paying attention.  Now the principal actors had emerged from their plush trailers and suddenly there were half a dozen top hats, including that of their current client.  John doubted that the blackmailers would try anything here, there would be no payout if their mark was dead, but if he was frightened…now that could be altogether more profitable.  Sherlock had scrutinized the movie’s budget.  It was no wonder that the insurers were prepared to pay Sherlock Holmes any amount to solve their problem.  
  
There was a call for quiet and from the gaggle of folk around the camera opposite, John actually heard someone say “Action!” A bit of him had always wondered whether that really happened.  He was still watching Sherlock down the road when there was some confused shouting, the clatter of hooves on cobblestones and suddenly he was pulled backwards as the paper-boy leapt for the reins of the runaway horse.  He had barely regained his balance, when there was a cry of “Cut!” and everyone began to return to their previous positions.  
  
“You okay there?” asked the jockey, jogging up to him and beginning to gather up his spilled papers.  
  
“Are we doing it again?” John asked, straightening his bowler hat.  
  
“That old mare’s a pro, stopped dead on her mark and now they want to move it back a bit for a longer shot. They’ll try it a few more times.” He sidled up to John and lowered his voice, “It’s a new second-unit director…wants to impress.”  
  
The stars had disappeared again and John had located Sherlock.  He was standing behind the camera, in a place where extras would not usually be allowed, looking at the monitor that played back the footage.  John watched him tilt his head slightly and then roll his shoulders and a smile began deep inside John that warmed the pit of his stomach and crept upwards until John wondered if it was that making the ends of his new moustache curl so jauntily.  
  
It had been a forfeit for some truly atrocious behaviour.  John knew he was being set up.  There would be time to get Sherlock back onto an even keel after this case was over, but for the time being he would indulge him and even as they’d been ushered into the film company’s wardrobe department for kitting out, John had known just how to keep Sherlock’s focus.  
  
He had thought of those tailored shirts that skimmed Sherlock’s ribcage – the purple one in particular, one hundred percent cotton, and when the wardrobe assistant had begun to pull out clothing for them from the long racks, he’d pointed at some woollen long-johns.  
  
“Those look authentic,” he’d said cheerily and as the woman nodded, had added, “we’ll start with those…might as well do it properly.”  
  
In the heat of Helmand, the kit had never been comfortable, but he was used to it. A little stimulation to Sherlock’s skin, not to the extent of actual chafing, would produce the desired, the greatly desired, effect.


End file.
